The senator and potential justice discuss kids and sheep

At Tuesday's marathon 11-hour Senate hearing for Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch, the questions were mostly tense, about constitutional interpretation and money in politics. An exception came when Texas' junior senator asked the judge about how he treated his law clerks.

Specifically, Sen. Ted Cruz asked at the end of his 30 minutes of questioning, did you take them to the rodeo?

Here is the conversation between Cruz and Gorsuch.

Cruz: I understand that you like to take your law clerks — some of them very much not from the West – to the Denver rodeo every year, and to have them observe and react to cattle roping and bronc riding and mutton busting. Is that true? And can you share a bit of your experiences and, even better, theirs in that regard?

Gorsuch: I get a lot of law clerks from my area ... but I get plenty from out of the area too. And we have a great rodeo in Denver every year, Grand National. It begins with a parade down 17th Street —which would be like a parade down Pennsylvania Avenue in D.C. — where you have cattle. It's a cattle drive down the main road in Denver. They shut it down. That's how you mark the opening of the grand national. And the closing of the Grand National is celebrated by the prize steer getting to spend a little time in the Brown Palace Hotel [a well-known ritzy hotel in Denver]. ...

The kids show their animals. My kids never made it to the Grand National; they’re more county-fair types, with their chickens and their rabbits and their dogs and whatever. …

And then there's mutton busting. And I think my children still have PTSD from mutton busting. [Cruz laughs.]

Mutton busting, as you know, comes sort of like bronco busting for adults. You take a poor little kid, you find a sheep, and you attach the one to the other and see how long they can hold on. [Hearing room laughs.]

Photo: Michael Ciaglo, Houston Chronicle

Claire Schneider, 5, hits the dirt after mutton bustin' during round one of Super Series IV at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo Thursday, March 16.

Claire Schneider, 5, hits the dirt after mutton bustin' during...

It works fine when the sheep has got a lot of wool. I tell my kids to hold on monkey-style – you know, really get in there [gesturing]. Because if you sit upright, you go flying off. … The problem when you get in is that you're so locked in that the poor clown has to come and knock you off the sheep. And my daughters, they got knocked around pretty good over the years. [Gorsuch laughs.]

Cruz [As his 30 minutes ends]: As a Texan, I think everyone’s life could be rendered richer by going to the rodeo, and I thank you for sharing that experience with your clerks.